


Falling With Eyes Wide Open

by Nelly-Belly (Nelleri)



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Depression, M/M, Talk of Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-05
Updated: 2014-12-05
Packaged: 2018-02-28 05:30:45
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,277
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2720516
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nelleri/pseuds/Nelly-Belly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I don’t know what it was that possessed me to raise my head and look in that direction, but I did, and nearly froze in terror. There was a man standing on the outer ledge of the bridge, staring down at the rocks below."</p><p> </p><p>A mysterious, raven-haired man pulls our dear Eren out of the rut his life has become.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Falling With Eyes Wide Open

**Author's Note:**

> beta'd by [ tsc](http://archiveofourown.org/users/tsc) and [OtakuTrash_of_England](http://archiveofourown.org/users/OtakuTrash_of_England/pseuds/OtakuTrash_of_England).

I was walking home from class, not unlike any other day. The sun was setting and it was a typical, but beautiful scene. I walked this same route every evening, and the beauty of the sunset no longer affected me like it used to.

When you traverse the same sidewalks, pass the same buildings, and walk through the same park every day, you begin to notice things less. The pinkish hue that washed the nearly empty park; sure it was something straight out of a painting, but my mind was elsewhere. Thinking about upcoming exams and presentations; deadlines and possible failure.

So it was by some miracle that I happened to lift my head as I was about to pass the old bridge. It was no longer in use; it had been built in the early days of the town back when railroads were the main mode of transportation. Even the river that it had been originally built to pass over was no longer existent. Now there was nothing but jagged rocks in a dry riverbed, under a rickety old bridge.

I don’t know what it was that possessed me to raise my head and look in that direction, but I did, and nearly froze in terror. There was a man standing on the outer ledge of the bridge, staring down at the rocks below.

I looked around frantically; there were a few people on the path but not near enough and certainly not paying attention. My heart racing in my chest with uncertainty, I began jogging towards the fence that closed off the entrance to the bridge.

_Should I be doing this? Is it any of my business?_

_Of course I should. This is a human’s life, I have to do something._

My mind battled even as my feet continued to carry me. I vaguely considered calling the police, but quickly threw the idea aside. There might not be time for that. I gripped the wood of the fence and began to climb over, with chips of old paint flaking off in the process.

Once on the other side, my eyes scanned the side of the bridge I had seen the man on. He was still there. Not wanting to startle him, I walked slowly in his direction, the old wooden planks of the bridge creaking under my weight. He didn’t move as I approached, just continued to stare down at the rocks that were probably a good fifty feet below him.

When I was near enough to speak, I opened my mouth in an attempt to calmly talk him from the edge, but found I couldn’t find the words. I’d seen things like this on TV before, but when you’re actually _in_ the situation, what the hell is the right thing to say? A person’s life was dangling in front of me and my words alone could hold the power to save him, or push him further.

Before I could even expel a breath, his voice rang out clear through the gentle breeze, “Care to join me?” He sounded so calm. I expected a wavering, tearful voice, but he was so level, as if he had only come up there to enjoy the view.

“I—I think you should come back on this side of the railing,” I stuttered.

I heard a noise come from him that sounded strangely like a laugh. He turned his head to look at me, his cold grey eyes shrouded in tiredness. “Come on, live a little.”

I wanted to argue the contradiction of that statement, but instead found myself setting my book bag down and approaching the wooden railing. I thought that maybe if I got closer to him I could talk him into coming back to the other side of the railing with me. So with a deep breath, I carefully swung a leg over, making sure to get my stability on the ledge – which was a little less than a foot of clearance from the railing – before bringing my other leg to join.

My knuckles were white with how hard I was gripping the railing, and I refused to look down; instead focusing my eyes on the man next to me. He was definitely attractive, but I couldn’t figure his age. He was short and had a youthful looking face, but the bags under his eyes spoke of years of unrest. The soft breeze made his black hair waver revealing a buzzed undercut. He was dressed in a baggy, long sleeve cream-colored shirt and black jeans. And the oddest part of it all was how relaxed he appeared as he gazed down, with only one hand lightly laying on the railing behind him.

“You… you uh… you don’t need to do this. I’m sure whatever problems you have going on, there’s a better way to go about dealing with them.” The words shakily left my lips, sounding like a bad script from some crime drama.

He tilted his head and looked at me with a raised brow, almost looking surprised at my words but un-amused all at the same time. “I’m not going to jump, kid,” he said as if it were common sense.

I stared at him incredulously. “Then… why are you up here?” I was tempted to hop back on the safe side of the railing, but something in his eyes made me want to stay and listen.

He let out a sigh and knelt down to sit on the ledge, his feet dangling off the side. Never letting my contact break with the railing, I followed until I was sitting as well, my hands now gripping the posts of the railing at my sides.

When I looked back to him, he was eyeing me with amusement. “What’s your name?” he asked.

“Eren.”

“Pleasure to meet you, I’m sure. Call me Levi.”

“O-Okay…”

He was so casual and relaxed, as if we weren’t precariously hanging on a ledge above a fifty-foot drop down to a bed of rocks. If he wasn’t here to jump, what was his reason?

As if he read my mind he nodded his head towards the path I had been walking on only minutes ago on my way home. “How many people do you think saw me up here?” he asked.

I blinked a couple times and looked over towards the path. There were still only a few people on it. Come the weekend, the area would probably be full of kids and teenagers, but for now there was a bleak scattering of people.

“I don’t think anyone saw you,” I responded, “Otherwise someone would have called the cops, or come over here before me, right?”

Levi clicked his tongue, turning his eyes towards the sky. “Wrong. Tonight I counted 8 people, you included. Most would quickly turn their head away; try to pretend they hadn’t seen me. One of them actually stopped to take a picture with their phone before carrying on their way.”

For a moment I felt a surge of pride in myself, for being the only one that had stopped to try and help. He leveled me with those cold grey eyes, “Don’t go patting yourself on the back, kiddo. This isn’t my first time being up here. I’ve seen you walk that path a number of times,” he tilted his head inquisitively, “and not once did you raise your head before today.”

I gulped, the pride I felt a moment ago quickly turning to shame. “That’s what I see with most people,” he continued, staring off into the distance, “They walk on as if they’re in a daze, minds too cluttered with worries to notice the world around them. Makes me wonder if anyone would even notice if I _did_ jump.” As he finished his sentence he glanced back down to the riverbed.

My face must have twisted into something of dismay, because he looked to me and waved a hand. “Don’t worry, I won’t.”

“Then… _why_ do you come up here? Just to see if anyone notices?” I asked, trying to not sound accusatory.

He smirked, “That’s probably a part of it; seeing how many people shuffle through this world with a blindfold. Really though, I just like to toy with the idea of actually doing it. I come up here and I feel more alive than I have at any point in my life. Straddling the line so closely, thinking about how _easy_ it would be to just stop existing. End everything; all my thoughts and feelings, all just stop in a matter of moments. All if I were to just lean a little further forward…” he trailed off, his chest teetering forward.

In my moment of sheer panic, I let go of one of the railing posts in favor of grabbing his shoulder and pushing him back. “Please don’t do that!” I practically shrieked.

He gave me another tilting stare, as if he were trying to read my inner most thoughts. “Isn’t it strange how much you care about my life?”

“I don’t think so… Life is precious, and it shouldn’t be wasted.”

“Hmm… I wonder about that. I’d argue that living a life, blind to your surroundings, is a life wasted.” He glared down to the path as he said this.

I took a breath to steel myself, tightening my grip on his shoulder in an attempt to reassure him. “Look, I don’t know what you’ve been through in life, but it can all get better.”

He rolled his eyes at that. “I already told you I wasn’t going to jump,” he said as he shrugged my hand off his shoulder. “You can stop with your sappy bullshit. Besides, I haven’t had a bad life.”

“Oh… You just seem…” I trailed off, not knowing how to finish that sentence without offending him.

“Broken? Dejected? Pessimistic? Yeah, I am. Doesn’t mean I have some harrowing back-story, though. People always assume you had to have lived through some shit to have mental issues. Truth of the matter is some of us are just born fucked up.” He sighed heavily before continuing, “I’ve had a normal life, like any regular jack-off. My brain just has a different way of thinking about things, and no, I’m not trying to say I’m a special snowflake. I suffer from depression, plain and simple.”

“Oh… I’m sorry,” I said, feeling like I’d pried too much.

“Not your fault and I don’t need your pity. It’s something I’ve lived with thus far, I’ll survive.”

“I see.”

“So, now that you know why I’m up here; what about you?” he asked, tilting his head in my direction.

I raised a brow at him, “Are you asking why I’m up here?” He nodded. “I’m up here because I thought you were going to jump, of course!”

“And if was going to jump, you were going to try to stop me?” He was leaning towards me, and I was suddenly aware of how close we were sitting. I could feel the warmth his body was radiating and it made my heart beat just a tiny bit quicker.

I gulped and answered, “Y-yeah. I wanted to at least try to help.”

He sighed and leaned back, “How very gallant of you.” His eyes shot towards the path once more, “Really though, you could have just kept walking like all the others… That’s where you differ. The moment you looked outside of your blinders and saw something out of place, you reacted. You _pounced_ on the opportunity to do something, even if it meant diverting from your well-formed, rut of a life.”

It seemed like he was paying me a compliment of sorts, and I could feel my cheeks heating up. Was reacting to someone being in danger really that unique of a response?

We sat in silence for a while. For most of it, he would either stare down at the riverbed or at the path, but occasionally I would feel his eyes on me. When I would look back at him he would quickly avert his eyes downwards to the riverbed again, but in the split second our eyes met I swore I could see a deep curiosity burning in his stormy irises.  

I still wanted to get him on the other side of the railing, but he seemed perfectly content where he was. Eventually, he broke the silence, just as the sun dropped out of sight behind the horizon.

“Don’t you have to get home?” He sounded almost reluctant to ask.

“Well, I probably should. I live alone, though. So it’s fine.”

Levi hummed and tilted his head back to stare up at the dark blue sky. I attempted to follow his gaze but was immediately flooded with vertigo, my hands flying to the post next to me to balance myself.

I heard him chuckling and I bit my lip in embarrassment. “Why are you even still here?” he asked, laughter still in his voice, “You’re clearly terrified of heights.”

“I’m not scared of heights!” I said, defensively. “I’m just scared of dying.”

“Mmm… But isn’t it a little thrilling? Can’t you feel how the blood is pumping through each and every vein in your body right now?” As he spoke, he leaned in closer to me, one of his hands coming to rest on my thigh.

And _yes_ he was right. I could feel the thrill he was speaking of, but in that moment all I could focus on was the hand on my thigh. That is, until I felt his breath against my ear.

“Wh-what are you doing?” I stammered.

“Testing something.” As he said this his hand started trailing up my thigh towards my crotch and I could feel his lips touching lightly at my ear lobe.

My hand flew forward and I gripped his wrist. “Levi, what the hell?” I was staring at him, wide-eyed, and he was peering back at me with that same look of intense curiosity I had caught glimpses of before. A smirk took over his features and he tilted his head.

“Come on, live a little,” the same words he’d said earlier that had got me to join him on the ledge.

Despite my better judgment, I released his wrist. He grinned at his victory and resumed trailing his fingers up my thigh. Whether it was from our precarious location, or from the sensation of his touch, or a combination of the two, I was already breathing heavily by the time his fingers reached the zipper of my pants.

“You looked up today; you opened your eyes and saw me. I wonder why that is?” His voice was a deep rumble that sent shivers running through my body. He began dragging his lips up and down my neck, his words buzzed against my skin as he spoke, “There’s something inside you, isn’t there? There’s something that pines for _more_ than your mundane life. Tell me, do you enjoy feeling this alive, _Eren?_ ”

 “ _Yes_.” The word fell from my lips before I had a chance to even consider answering. My eyes fluttered shut as his hand cupped my semi-erection through my jeans, causing me to let out a hiss. The vertigo of having my eyes closed felt like waves crashing into my body, but I knew I was sitting still.

“Good,” he whispered in my ear, his voice grounding me.

Somewhere in the back of my mind my conscious was screaming at me to stop this. It was insane, sitting on the ledge of the bridge, one false move away from falling to my almost certain death, while some stranger undid the button of my pants.

But _God_ the fucking adrenaline surging through me was addictive; I couldn’t have told him to stop. I needed more; I needed to reach that peak.

I leaned back slightly as he slipped his hand into my boxers, letting out a pleased sigh when I felt his hand wrapping firmly around my cock and pulling it free.

“I knew it…” he breathed as he began pumping my cock, his breath was hot against my ear. “I knew you were like me.” He sounded enthused and excited; it was more emotion than I’d heard from him since he started talking to me nearly thirty minutes ago.

I wanted to do something for him as well. Touch him, kiss him, _something._ But any and all thoughts quickly left me as he leaned forward and wrapped his lips around my length. My eyes shot open and I stared down at him as he began to work me over. Just past his bobbing head, I could see the dark shapes of the rocks below.

And for some reason, I wasn’t scared. Seeing the ground so far away should have had me clutching at the railing like it had before, but my hands found their way into his hair instead.

He had one arm wrapped around my back, and the other holding the base of my cock while he licked and sucked at the tip. With both of my hands in his hair, there was nothing securing us to the bridge, only our weight. If one of us were to shift too far forward, we could both easily go careening downwards.

 _But I wasn’t scared._ Just like he had said earlier, straddling that line, being so close to everything ending was _thrilling._ There was so much sensation, so much adrenaline in that moment and the thought that it could all suddenly _stop_ made my mind go numb with excitement.

It was all too much, and all I could do was tug on his hair while I gasped and whined to let him know I was close. He didn’t stop; he didn’t pull away, but _moaned_ around me as his hand started jacking me off with ardor, all while sucking away at the head, flicking his tongue and urging me to cum.

And I felt like I was falling; no, flying. The feeling of the bridge safely under me was the farthest thing from my mind as I came in his mouth. My hands scrabbled for purchase in his hair and my mouth opened in a silent scream as everything came crashing through me.

He gave one last hard suck, making me shudder, before he sat back up. My hands returned to the railing posts at my sides and I watched him with lidded eyes as he leaned forward to spit my load down to the rocks below.

“What the fuck just happened?” I asked between harsh breaths.

He looked at me and grinned, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “You just experienced the epitome of existentialism. Cumming in the face of death, fucking poetic.”

I tucked myself back into my pants as he stood and hopped over the railing. Well, at least I had finally got him on the safer side, right? When I carefully stood up, he offered out a hand to help me over. We stood there, staring at each other in the moonlight on the old abandoned bridge.

After everything that had just happened, I wasn’t sure what to say. I felt like something very fundamental had changed within me. As he had said, there was something inside me, something dormant that he had awakened. I didn’t know what to do at that point, all I knew was I didn’t want this to be the last time I saw him. So I asked, “Can I see you again?”

He chuckled as he turned to head in the opposite direction I had come from. “Maybe,” he called out from over his shoulder, “If you keep your eyes open.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> I dunno where this came from X_x I hope it was at least a little bit enjoyable~
> 
> Comments and kudos give me life ❤
> 
> ~[Mah Tumblr](http://nelleri.tumblr.com/)~


End file.
